I found this book to be really boring. I initially really enjoyed the first few pages, but the author jumped around so much, I found the book confusing. She would start talking about something from her past, switch to some other point in time, and than jump back. It was only a little over 200 pages, but felt like it was 800 pages. By the end of this memoir I found the author downright irritating in her lack of self-esteem. I wanted to yell at her to get a hobby & stop whining. I realize she has been through some very very hard times in a dysfunctional family, and there are moments of clarity where I found the writing style quite fluid and beautiful. However, this book couldn't end soon enough for me.

We read another of her books - My Dream of You - in our book club. That led me to buy and try to read this earlier book - Are You Somebody? - by this author. I lost patience with this one, and gave up after about 40 pages. Other readers obviously didn't agree with me as this book was a NY Times Best Seller.

Some small parts of the book were interesting, but overall really boring. Too much introspection and dragging on and on about some things so that after a while you didn't care. I wish she had written more details about her childhood, describing the everyday life of poverty and dealing with the oppression of the Catholic schools and the church in general.

This could have been called Sex and the Irish Girl. It starts with her hormones in the teenaged years and ends plaintively wishing she was not too old to attract men any more. The rest covers the despressing effects of being raised by an absentee father and alcoholic mother. The author does a LOT of name-dropping, but since I didn't know any of the names, some of the paragrahs simply read as lists of people. Uninteresting and uninspiring.

This could have been called Sex and the Irish Girl. It starts with her hormones in the teenaged years and ends plaintively wishing she was not too old to attract men any more. The rest covers the despressing effects of being raised by an absentee father and alcoholic mother. The author does a LOT of name-dropping, but since I didn't know any of the names, some of the paragrahs simply read as lists of people. Uninteresting and uninspiring.

This could have been called Sex and the Irish Girl. It starts with her hormones in the teenaged years and ends plaintively wishing she was not too old to attract men any more. The rest covers the despressing effects of being raised by an absentee father and alcoholic mother. The author does a LOT of name-dropping, but since I didn't know any of the names, some of the paragrahs simply read as lists of people. Uninteresting and uninspiring.

This could have been called Sex and the Irish Girl. It starts with her hormones in the teenaged years and ends plaintively wishing she was not too old to attract men any more. The rest covers the despressing effects of being raised by an absentee father and alcoholic mother. The author does a LOT of name-dropping, but since I didn't know any of the names, some of the paragrahs simply read as lists of people. Uninteresting and uninspiring.

This could have been called Sex and the Irish Girl. It starts with her hormones in the teenaged years and ends plaintively wishing she was not too old to attract men any more. The rest covers the despressing effects of being raised by an absentee father and alcoholic mother. The author does a LOT of name-dropping, but since I didn't know any of the names, some of the paragrahs simply read as lists of people. Uninteresting and uninspiring.

This could have been called Sex and the Irish Girl. It starts with her hormones in the teenaged years and ends plaintively wishing she was not too old to attract men any more. The rest covers the despressing effects of being raised by an absentee father and alcoholic mother. The author does a LOT of name-dropping, but since I didn't know any of the names, some of the paragrahs simply read as lists of people. Uninteresting and uninspiring.

This could have been called Sex and the Irish Girl. It starts with her hormones in the teenaged years and ends plaintively wishing she was not too old to attract men any more. The rest covers the despressing effects of being raised by an absentee father and alcoholic mother. The author does a LOT of name-dropping, but since I didn't know any of the names, some of the paragrahs simply read as lists of people. Uninteresting and uninspiring.

A very open, honest memoir. Interesting view of the life of a poor, Catholic, North Dublin upbringing, and a woman's path to professional success, contrasted with personal loneliness and sense of longing realized in middle age.

This book was an amazing read, one I would highly recommend to all out there, it touched my heart and soul to read Nualas words, and I connected to her story on so many levels....at one point I saw myself in her story....

bookaddict reviewed Are You Somebody? : The Accidental Memoir of a Dublin Woman on 7/24/2007

I just wasn't as captivated by this book as I wanted to be. Well-written, but rather dry, and the events did not seem to justify a book. It's nice to hear the Irish woman's voice, instead of the constant Irish man's paean to Mom (who was too damned busy to dwell on her own life, and didn't have the time to write it down herself). Still, I prefer those to this one. It wasn't unpleasant to read, but I didn't find it very satisfying.